The covenant surrounds a small tower, four stories high, with one or two rooms per story. For small covenants, the tower is appended to a fortified courtyard, into which stock are driven in troubled times. Larger covenants surround the tower with outbuildings, which are wooden and lack defensive value. A stone wall, six feet high and without a walkway, surrounds these buildings.
Towers allow their inhabitants to see approaching forces from a greater distance, and increase the field of fire of magi and crossbowmen, but are much less comfortable to live in than manor houses. The magi probably have a hall in the courtyard and use the tower as a storehouse, retreating to it only in times of immediate threat. Towers used only as retreats and observation posts, called pele towers, are even less comfortable than tower houses.
A tower cannot hold off a determined force of soldiers. A traditional method of killing the inhabitants of a tower is to stack wood about it, then set the wood on fire, smoking the defenders to death. A tower cannot act as a staging area for large military groups, and alarms minor landholders only, so it does not count as a castle.
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